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2.1.3-Maedhrys
Brick!Club 2.1.3: June 18, 1815 Let us go back, for such is the storyteller’s right… I wonder if we could compile a document from various Hugo works? “The Rights of Novelist and Storyteller.” That’d make an interesting project. Then again, the emphasis on the power of the small—this time, as used by the great: If it had not rained on the night of June 17, 1815, the future of Europe would have been different. A few drops more or less tipped the balance against Napoleon. For Waterloo to be the end of Austerlitz, Providence needed only a little rain. (What’s the Austerlitz reference mean? It keeps coming up. If nobody can tell me, I’ll need to research that.) In the part where Hugo questions how much of the defeat is Napoleon’s fault, it’s pretty clear that he has a high degree of admiration for him at least as a general—after all, Hugo has a keen sense for the grand and the glorious, and I suppose he sees some of that in Napoleon’s skill. Really, it’s comparable to the way Marius talks about him (which leads back to the often-mentioned idea that Marius is meant to reflect Hugo as a young man, and also gives some balance that we may try to understand Marius’ perspective a little better.) And then there’s this quote, which I saw circulating (even reblogged, myself) not long ago, and which hernaniste made a fabulous post about. We do not, of course, claim to be giving the history of Waterloo But what struck me was the context of that statement. We do not, of course, claim to be giving the history of Waterloo; one of the key scenes of the drama we are telling hangs on that battle, but the history of the battle is not our subject; that history moreover has been told, and told in a masterly way….As for us, we leave the historians to their struggle; we are merely a distant witness, a passerby on the plain, a researcher bending over this ground steeped in human flesh, perhaps taking appearances for realities; we have no right in the name of science to cope with a mass of facts undoubtedly tainted with mirage; we have neither the military experience nor the strategic ability to justify a system; in our opinion, a chain of events overruled both captains at Waterloo; and when destiny, that mysterious defendant, is called in, '''we judge like the people', that naive judge.'' Naive, perhaps, in the ways of destiny. But the people are the ones affected, after all. It’s their flesh, the flesh of their fellow men, that the ground is steeped in. When the people judge, do they deal scientifically with a mass of facts? No, but they do bend over the ground. They engage at the most human level, and they judge not from strategic knowledge or military experience or study of destiny but from their right as the people, affected by Waterloo despite the distance elapsed (see Marius, for example), the constant victims of wars both lost and won. Commentary Earendils I think the reason Hugo references it so much is both because it was an incredibly well-known battle, but also a textbook example of Napoleon’s strategic genius? Because Austerlitz, tactically speaking, was SERIOUSLY impressive. Laissezferre What the Julie Rose footnotes says about Austerlitz: A key part of the Napoleonic legend was the “sun of Austerlitz.” The battle of Austerlitz began in a heavy fog. The French soldiers advanced in spite of it, and when the sun suddenly burned off the mist, the Russian and Austrian troops were stunned to find a massive French force virtually on top of them. At Waterloo, by contrast, the heavy rains and muddy ground prevented Napoléon from executing his plans as he would have wished. So yes, small things having a large effect. And about history being seen by the people most affected, I can’t believe I’m inserting GOT references here, but I think this sums it up nicely. The common people pray for rain, healthy children, and a summer that never ends. It is no matter to them if the high lords play their game of thrones, so long as they are left in peace. They never are. So of course, they can look at history however they want, because they’re the most affected. But I think it’s necessary to note that in the next chapter (2.1.4), Hugo acknowledges that history will be the ultimate judge. While the contemporaries of the time can choose to look at a figure exclusively in the positive (or negative) light, history highlights both aspects, and is therefore, a better judge.